InternetNews.com states: "Microsoft (or a really smart ISV) should build a full application manager for Windows, similar to what most Linux distributions do today." Most Windows applications come with their own distinctive updating mechanism (much like Mac OS X), instead of having a centralised updating location like most Linux distributions offer. While it certainly wouldn't be harmful for Windows to gain such a feature - the question remains: isn't it time we rethink program installation and management altogether?

One of the nice things about the open source package managers is that they pretty much treat all software as equals. Or if they aren't equals, it is because an application isn't deemed as ready for the main repository based upon technical or legal issues.

The world of commercial software doesn't work like that. Every vendor wants to see their product get the best shelf space, even if it isn't the best product. In order to achieve this goal, they are quite willing to pay for that shelf space.

So Microsoft's would sorta be stuck in a quandray if they set up a Linux like package manager. Who gets the top spot if someone searches for CADD software? Okay, maybe that's an easy one. The company that pays for the top spot gets that top spot. Now what if a user was searching for a word processor? You know very well who Microsoft wants on the top. You also know very well that the lawyers at Microsoft's competitors are going to be reading a few anti-trust cases. In other words, it's a no-win for Microsoft.

It is also a no-win for the consumer. If Microsoft set up a package manager, it would pretty much be the one stop and only stop that most people make while looking for software. It would be dead simple for a vendor to buy their way to the top of the list because there would only be one list that really matters. They may not earn. Not everyone is going to jump at a product because of that, but you can bet a greater portion of the unwashed masses would.

Now a unified update manager is a different story. That would probably work.